The present disclosure relates to slide rails and image forming apparatuses.
For sheet feed cassettes in image forming apparatuses, such as copiers, etc., slide rails are provided to facilitate putting in/taking out, that is, insertion/drawing of the sheet feed cassettes relative to the main bodies of the image forming apparatuses. Besides this, in drawers for furniture and kitchens, slide rails are also provided to facilitate putting in/taking out, that is, insertion/drawing of the drawers from their corresponding main bodies. As such a slide rail, for example, a structure has been known which is provided with a fixed rail having a substantially C-shaped cross section fixed at an equipment main body of an image forming apparatus and a moving rail having a substantially C-shaped cross section slidably held by the fixed rail through a ball retainer that includes ball bearings.
A recent demand is that sheet feed cassettes, drawers, and the like are detachable from their corresponding main bodies in an operation, such as maintenance. In order to be detachable, some type of slide rail includes a support member on the inner surface of the front end part of the fixed rail to support the front end part of the moving rail. In the support member, a support protrusion is formed which protrudes toward the moving rail and being in contact with a bent edge of the moving rail.